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Unleashed - Midvinterblot
Release: 2006Label: Steamhammer / SPV
By: Anders
Posted: Oct 22, 2006
The Swedish warriors are back with their new album "Midvinterblot", merely a couple of years after the release of the great "Sworn Allegiance". Since then the band has changed from Century Media, the label which has released the entire material from the band until now, to SPV/Steamhammer. Though Unleashed hasn't changed, we still get heavy death metal with blistering melodies, mythological references and hitting atmospheres.
Johnny Hedlund and the rest of the band is still an angry bunch of people who deliver their death metal with a lot of anger and energy, the material on "Midvinterblot" is very intense and hits it straight off, you are hooked after a single listen. The repetitive riffing and pummelling rhythm in the title track together with the distinctive and easily recognizable growl from Hedlund paint the atmosphere and gives us yet a classic Unleashed track. Even though much of the music on "Midvinterblot" is in the vein of classic Unleashed, there have once again sneaked a bit of the aggressive hardcore/punk tendencies into the music and we do also have a couple of fast and really good tracks. Especially drummer Anders Schultz is delivering a hell of a job on the album, with some killer rhythms and patterns, and some quite varied play. The guitar work do also need a word or 2, there are the classic heavy and catchy basic riffs that drives the songs forward, though on top of that we get some really good and awesome melodic leads and solos, some of the guitar work is really amazing!
"Midvinterblot" is an album that fuses old and classic Unleashed with some of their newer influences and a lot of aggression, I don't know if we can call the band reborn, though they are back with new fuel and a lot of fire! The band is aware on the present and the past when talking about the lyrics, and the lyrical aspects are transferred really well into the music and the atmospheres are always fitting, Unleashed as we know them, with a slightly different sound and approach to some of the songs, though still a more than worthy album to the collection of the prior works of Unleashed!
Johnny Hedlund and the rest of the band is still an angry bunch of people who deliver their death metal with a lot of anger and energy, the material on "Midvinterblot" is very intense and hits it straight off, you are hooked after a single listen. The repetitive riffing and pummelling rhythm in the title track together with the distinctive and easily recognizable growl from Hedlund paint the atmosphere and gives us yet a classic Unleashed track. Even though much of the music on "Midvinterblot" is in the vein of classic Unleashed, there have once again sneaked a bit of the aggressive hardcore/punk tendencies into the music and we do also have a couple of fast and really good tracks. Especially drummer Anders Schultz is delivering a hell of a job on the album, with some killer rhythms and patterns, and some quite varied play. The guitar work do also need a word or 2, there are the classic heavy and catchy basic riffs that drives the songs forward, though on top of that we get some really good and awesome melodic leads and solos, some of the guitar work is really amazing!
"Midvinterblot" is an album that fuses old and classic Unleashed with some of their newer influences and a lot of aggression, I don't know if we can call the band reborn, though they are back with new fuel and a lot of fire! The band is aware on the present and the past when talking about the lyrics, and the lyrical aspects are transferred really well into the music and the atmospheres are always fitting, Unleashed as we know them, with a slightly different sound and approach to some of the songs, though still a more than worthy album to the collection of the prior works of Unleashed!
Rating: 8/10
Unleashed website
Distributed in Denmark and kindly supplied by Target
Distributed in Denmark and kindly supplied by Target
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